DA announces arrests in cross-border drug probe

A two-year investigation into a drug-trafficking organization with ties to Southern California and Mexico has led to the arrests of 16 people in San Diego and the seizure of more than 1,000 pounds of methamphetamine, county District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis announced Friday.

The law enforcement effort has struck a blow to the Knights Templar Cartel, a splinter group that formed in 2011 from the disarray caused by the breakup of another cartel, La Familia Michoacan.

The Knights Templar group is one of the largest smugglers of methamphetamine into the United States, said Stephen Tomaski, assistant special agent in charge of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration office in San Diego.

In addition to the methamphetamine, investigators seized more than 200 pounds of cocaine, 28 pounds of heroin and $200,000 in cash.

County prosecutors have filed charges against 30 people in a dozen separate cases. This week, 16 of the defendants were arrested; another 14 remain at large. Among the charges they face are drug possession, sales, transportation and conspiracy.

At a news conference, Dumanis said that during the investigation drugs were found in cars, stash houses, taped to the bodies of human smugglers and even buried in the backyards of homes. She said the probe opened a window into a large-scale cross-border drug group.

“The river of illegal drugs streaming across the border isn’t slowing down,” she said.

But the arrests and ongoing investigation are a harsh blow to the operations of the Knights Templar, Dumanis said.

Tomaski said the investigation into the group came out of a larger probe of La Familia between 2009 and 2010. That investigation spanned the U.S. and Mexico, and led to the disintegration of La Familia.

With the cartel in disarray, a splinter group started by a former top leader emerged as the Knights Templar, Tomaski said.

The group has a quasi-religious culture and strictly enforces some 53 rules for members, including not speaking to outsiders and being drug free. Some members even undergo drug testing before being allowed into the group, Tomaski said.

With some 1,200 members, the Knights Templar is the biggest distributor of methamphetamine from Mexico into the U.S., he said. Tomaski described most of those arrested as mid- to high-level members of the cartel.